


Follow Me To A Home

by wasp



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: F/M, Genderswap, always-a-girl!louis, roller derby!AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-11-15
Updated: 2012-11-15
Packaged: 2017-11-18 17:24:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,456
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/563562
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wasp/pseuds/wasp
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He doesn’t want to see his expression in the mirror, he has a feeling every single thing he feels for Louis is painted so blatantly on his face.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Follow Me To A Home

**Author's Note:**

> Spin-off fic from [Lost In The Thrill Of It All](http://archiveofourown.org/works/563558) for [julia](http://www.intherubble.livejournal.com)

The first time Louis meets Liam, she can barely see through the blood that's smudged all over her face. It’s sticking her eyelashes together in hot, sticky clumps and she doesn’t even know how the blood from an elbow to the nose transferred all the way _there_. She attempts to keep her head up, she vaguely remembers something about tilting her head back during nosebleeds, she can never remember. This only means she blindly skates into one of the lockers, the hand cupping her nose knocking harshly against it. She swears loudly and gropes around with her hands, trying to feel her way around the changing room.

“Caroline? I did what you told me not to do,” she says, her nose swollen and her voice nasally. She stops edging forward when her knees hit the bench resting in the middle, hopefully where her captain is sitting.

“Oh god,” a man’s voice says instead and Louis can barely make out the flurry of movement and a slight whistle from Caroline before someone’s mopping at her face with surprisingly gentle hands. Definitely not Caroline’s method of fixing her girls up.

She figures it’s the man and holds her face up expectantly until the most of the mess is wiped off and she can blink her vision clear. Her nose is still bleeding profusely and before she can get a good look at his face, he’s got a firm hand at the back of her neck and pushing forward gently. He’s pinching at her nose, under the bony bridge with capable fingers that seems to know what they’re doing, so she lets him.

From this angle, all she can see is that he’s using his t-shirt to stem the flow of the blood and that’s just making it easier for Louis, really. She reaches out and tweaks a nipple because he has a nice chest and why the fuck not. The man squeaks in a decidedly undignified manner but doesn’t remove his hands, strong fingers pressing into her skin.

“Who’s this?” she asks the room at large, unsure whether to direct the question at Caroline or the stranger. Sometimes Caroline doesn’t let her boyfriends talk.

“Our new coach,” is all Caroline says and Louis can see her get off the bench.

“Really?” Liam asks in surprise, turning his head towards Caroline. Otherwise, he keeps a firm hold on Louis, his thumb swiping at the skin of her neck almost as if it’s second nature, as if he’s trying to comfort her.

“Yeah, these plays are brilliant, mate. You sure this is only your third game?” she asks, flipping through a neatly stapled booklet.

“This is my fourth one, actually. I used to skate when I was little but I only came to these games because Harry, uh, because Zayn wanted to try out,” he says, sounding pinched and uncomfortable. Louis wants to see his face because there’s a pink flush spreading down his neck and she wants to know what it’d look like staining his cheeks.

“I just met her, she’s fucking hilarious,” Louis says, muffled into the t-shirt. She reaches out a hand and smoothes it down Liam’s stomach because it’s out there in the open, having abs and stuff. Louis definitely wouldn’t mind having him as a new coach. Their current coach only shows up to practise half the time and even then he’s always drunk off his arse.

Liam chokes a little and tries to wriggle away from her hand, somehow not managing to jostle her sore nose. “She is?” he asks in genuine surprise. “She doesn’t usually like … people.”

“Mmhm, we made the curly kid think he broke my nose,” she says, grinning when Liam lifts his shirt off her face.

She _finally_ gets to look up when he tilts her head carefully, very gently running his thumb over the bridge of her tender nose. “It’s not broken but you should probably get it checked by a doctor, just to be safe,” he says, eyes focused and intent.

“You’re cute,” Louis says with a laugh, mostly because Louis doesn’t _do_ doctors and he is, actually, he’s _really_ cute, all puppy-brown eyes and curly hair. Liam looks confused for a moment, like he doesn’t know what to do and abruptly drops his hands from her face, balling his t-shirt in his fist.

“Why do you want to coach roller derby, anyway?” Caroline interrupts, raising an eyebrow at the bloody shirt and glancing at Louis’ face. “You look like you could be studying for something else.”

Liam shrugs, shifting his shirt from hand to hand and says, “I just like sports.”

Caroline looks at him for a moment, eyes narrowing in scrutiny before she turns to Louis. “Stop getting into fights with the winning team and traumatising curly children.”

Louis shrugs at Liam as if to say _what can you do_ and shouts at her retreating back, “She started it!”

“By what? Winning?” Caroline throws over her shoulder, exiting the changing rooms to probably go chastise Harry for coming to the games.

“I’m not sure if I should tell you my name, you’ve already got my blood,” Louis says, twisting her mouth to the side and looking Liam’s still shirtless self up and down.

“Oh, I’m Liam,” he says hurriedly and holds out a hand.

Louis slaps it away and skates up closer until she can look up at his face, eyes wide and amused. “Has anyone told you that you look like a llama mated with that Canadian dicksuck?” she asks, tilting her head to the side.

He splutters, shuffling backwards until Louis backs off, sitting down to pull at her skates. Her teammates are all probably in the car park waiting for her to go to their pub; she’s already stalled for enough time as it is.

“Justin Bieber? Not until now,” he says and his eyes widen when she starts to unzip the side of her skirt. He shuts them almost immediately, his face still turned towards her.

Louis laughs loudly, fascinated. He still doesn’t open his eyes as he says, “Um, I’m going to go now. It was nice to meet you.”

He hits his shoulder on the doorway on his way out, his eyes still unnecessarily shut and Louis’ smile widens.

~

“Would you still love me if I gave birth to a hippopotamus, a la virgin Mary style?” Louis asks, her knees bracketing Liam’s hips. They’ve got the sheets stretched over them for no other reason than it’s fucking freezing and the cold is hurting their lungs. She’s holding his wrists down to the pillow, leaning over him so her hair falls in a curtain around her face and tickles Liam’s nose, a smile on her face.

“What kind of hippopotamus?” Liam asks, tilting his chin up, trying to get closer.

“I don’t know,” Louis says, laughter barely contained behind that smile, “we just won’t know.”

Liam plants his feet flat against the bed, lifting his hips to try and knock her off balance. She only tightens her grip on him, squeezing her thighs around his waist in determination. He pauses for a moment in contemplation and says, “I’d look after the both of you a la Joseph, I guess, as long as we name it Taylor.”

Louis laughs with her head thrown back, the scent of her shampoo fading momentarily. Liam can see the dip of her collarbones and the way they seem to tremble from the force of her laughter, her huge t-shirt being tugged down. “Why Taylor?” she asks, leaning forward to hover over Liam again, shifting closer but keeping any real contact frustratingly out of reach.

Louis’ strong, she has the arms for keeping people down when she wants to, but he’s mostly obliging her by keeping still. Liam flexes his wrists against the pillows, grinning up at her, knowing full well he’s probably coming off as Zayn would say ‘doped up and in love’.

“I don’t know. Why are you giving birth to hippos?” he asks and Louis giggles, finally leaning down to kiss the sound against him.

Louis’ grip on his wrist slackens and he wriggles it free, cupping the back of her skull to keep her close and surging up. The sheets get pulled up along with them, letting in a cold gust of air before Liam tamps it down with his feet.

“My parents are going to be in town next week,” Liam says, wrapping his arms around Louis’ waist to keep her on his lap since she has a tendency to go rolling off the edge of the bed. He watches her with careful eyes, swallows nervously and asks, “We could – they want to – do _you_ want to meet them?”

Louis stares down at him for a moment, blue eyes wide and surprised with her hands tracing patterns over his back. She darts forward again to kiss his nose and says easily, “Of course.”

~

Louis thinks this is what dying must feel like. She can barely keep her eyes open but every time she shuts them it feels like a thousand needles are pushing through the shiny surface before it fades into blissful unconsciousness. She yawns, blinking wide awake again and rubs at her eyes, sore and tired.

“Why do you hate me?” Louis mock-whispers to Liam, sticking her toe in Zayn’s side. She’s curled up on the bench, fast asleep and Louis has never been more envious of her ability to fall asleep anyway.

“I don’t,” Liam says and as usual it’s earnest and _Liam_.

Louis sighs and gets off the bench, reaching for Liam in the way zombies reach for fresh meat. The rest of her teammates are in the same way, groping around for their skates because it’s fucking 6am in the morning and Liam’s officially the worst coach they’d ever had.

“I’m too tired to move,” Louis says but still manages to scramble onto Liam’s back, throwing her arms around his neck and clinging. She gets her legs around him as well, hooking her chin over his shoulder and pressing her cold nose against the skin behind his ear.

“Clearly not,” Liam says and he’s stopped sounding all choked up whenever Louis does this, he just sighs and hooks his arms around her legs so she won’t fall off.

“Jam for me,” Louis mumbles, her eyes slipping shut again. She shimmies slightly, the effort draining her of what little energy she had and yawns a ‘giddy-up, Payne’ into the side of his neck before she falls asleep.

~

“It’s just a restaurant, my dad picked it,” Liam says, trying to turn the page with one hand. He’s got an arm around Louis’ shoulder, both her hands playing with his fingers, both of them leaning against the headboard and each other. It’s _nice_.

“Do I have to wear a dress?” Louis mumbles, turning her head. “I only have one formal-ish dress,” she says and bites at Liam’s collarbone.

She lets go of his hand and crawls off the bed, jumping up to yank her cupboard open. She bends over, trying to reach something all the way at the back and Liam puts his book down to appreciate the view because Louis just really hates wearing trousers.

Louis straightens up again, holding a tiny frilly black thing to her chest. It looks like a giant cupcake and Liam raises an eyebrow, confused as to why she owns a kid’s dress.

“It’s what I wore to my parent’s funeral,” she says, a wicked grin unfurling as she shakes it out. Liam splutters because Louis has a tendency to say terrible things most of the time without meaning to and sometimes he can’t believe she’s a person that exists.

He just says, “That’s not gonna fit, is it?” as patiently as he can. He doesn’t care what Louis wears to the restaurant, she could possibly wear sweatpants and he’d be fine with it. However, his parents will and there’s also the possibility they’ll get kicked out of the restaurant before they can properly fall in love with Louis.

Louis looks at the dress in contemplation, raising an eyebrow. “Might,” is all she says, shrugging before tugging Liam’s shirt over her head. She steps into the dress and shimmies it up over her hips, tugging it up with difficulty.

Louis’ already tiny enough for it to rest at her waist, the zipper split open down her back and she shoves her arms through. He wants her to tell her to be careful in case she rips the dress, she’s kept it for a reason after all, but all she does is straighten her shoulders and he distantly hears some seams popping. She grins in triumph and strikes a ridiculous pose, looking silly and like a very confused baked good in mourning.

The flare of the dress is barely long enough for it to cover her arse and she _should_ look ludicrous but Liam can’t help the way his eyes are drawn to her long legs and the curve of her arse peeking out under the hemline and Liam already knew Louis was going to be the end of him one day. Still, he’s not going to do anything when Louis is in a dress she wore when she was five to her _parent’s funeral_.

“Liam Payne,” she says slowly, grinning at him madly. She bounces up and down so the skirt flies up over her arse. “Is this doing something for you, you big fat pervert. My work here is done, I’ve corrupted you,” she says and runs back onto the bed, jumping on him.

“No, go away,” Liam says, turning his head and reaching for his book again. “I’m not doing anything while you’re wearing that, Lou, _no_ ,” he says, trying to fend her off, Louis’ cackle loud in his ear.

~

Liam has come to terms with the fact Louis and Harry suffer from separation anxiety and that apparently means Louis seems to be there a lot when he comes home from school. It’s usually weirder not to see her in their flat, trying to do handstands against the wall and breaking everything while Harry eggs her on.

“Liam, this can’t be happening,” Louis says, eyes wide in horror and fixed on the telly. She doesn’t even turn around, knows it’s Liam and not Harry because he uses his key instead of kicking at the door impatiently.

She’s got a hand covering her mouth, Harry’s The O.C. dvds spilling all over the place. She already knows Marissa’s going to die on the side of the road but she still looks miserable.

“I’ve got dinner,” Liam says in an attempt to distract her, rustling the bag of Chinese food.

Louis jumps over the back of the couch, a huge grin settling in lieu of her earlier expression and she pats his chest, standing on her tippy-toes to kiss his chin sloppily. “I knew I kept you around for a reason,” she says and grabs the food off him, darting back to the couch and making room for Liam to sit down.

It takes another month for Liam to realise she’s moved in with them. It’s only when she falls asleep on the floor of their living room, trying to keep him company as he tries to finish his essay, that he carries her to the spare bedroom and finds it full of her stuff. She tells them it’s temporary, she set fire to her shared apartment by _accident_ and got kicked out but they’ll let her back sooner or later.

Combined with Harry’s mess, they both leave their flat like the fucking aftermath of a hurricane. She doesn’t clean up after herself and he keeps finding crumbs in the weirdest places and he can’t even say ‘we’re going to get ants’ because she only ends up quoting Archer at him until she’s cackling at her own brilliance.

She gets nightmares sometimes, crash and heave of metal against the road, being stuck in a car with her mum’s voice fading away, and she crawls into Liam’s bed, shivering like she’s stuck out in the cold again. The first time it’d happened, he’d been too sleepy to react as she’d wrapped his arms around her tightly, holding his arms around her middle so hard he tried to loosen his grip for fear of crushing her ribcage. Now he just holds her tight, as long as she needs to fall asleep again, and then tucks them together in a way that won’t leave bruises.

He doesn’t mind having Louis live with them, he can’t think of anywhere else she should be.

~

Liam’s so _nervous_ he needs to clench his hands around his knees in attempt to keep himself from biting at his nails like he so desperately wants to. He just wants his parents to like Louis and it shouldn’t be _hard_ , he thinks anyone who talks to her for five minutes should be capable of falling love with her cheeky grin and huge heart.

She’s late to the restaurant but she doesn’t look anything like herself. She must’ve borrowed a dress from Rebecca or something, it’s demure and elegant and it covers her bruised knees. It makes Liam’s breath catch a little, not because she looks gorgeous – she manages to do that every day, thanks – but because she’s done it for _him_. It just makes him want to see her in her own clothes again, a little ragged and a lot loved and familiar when he pulls it off her.

“Hey babe,” Louis says when he holds her seat out of her, kissing his cheek quickly. He smiles at her, his palms sweating when he trails his hand over her shoulder before taking his own seat again.

“Mum, dad, this is Louis,” he says and he’s gripping the edge of the table, too anxious to do much else. Louis shoots him a funny look and Liam tries to relax – it’s just, nobody expected the love of his life to have a _tongue piercing_.

It takes a while for Liam to sit like he’s not expecting to be zapped by lightning any moment now. Louis rests her hand at his knee, squeezing slightly and he shoots her a grateful smile, feeling a bit better. Dinner seems to be going okay, nobody’s crying or screaming and Louis’ looks comfortable and happy. He’s aware the conversations flowing around him and he should probably participate and snaps back into it.

“So what do you do, Louis?” his dad asks, looking up from his food.

“I work part time at this great record store down the street,” Louis says, nodding her head, “and I play roller derby.”

“Roller derby?” his mum asks, raising an eyebrow and says, “Isn’t that the one with the fishnet stockings and a lot of violence?”

Louis only flashes a smile, nodding again. Liam wants to tell his parents to _stop_ whatever they think they’re doing but the words get stuck in his throat. He looks to Louis but she’s saying something else, motioning to his mum’s bracelet. He doesn’t hear her though since her hand’s travelling higher up the inseam of his trousers. Liam chokes on his water and tugs at his collar, waving a hand at them.

“You alright, darling?” Louis asks, grinning as he tries to play the flush of his cheeks as the heat of the restaurant. She doesn’t move her hand and Liam’s trying to frown at her but she’s running a finger down the zipper of his trousers and he’s focusing all his energy on trying to stop the flush from spreading.

~

One day, Liam finds he can’t quite get out of bed to go to school. He tries to blink and stops immediately because _what the hell everything hurts_. He stops trying to haul himself out of his bed and lies back against the pillow, wonders what he’s done in his past life to deserve this.

“Leeeeeeeeee-yum,” Louis says, appearing at his doorway in Harry and her matching ‘his and her’ onesies. “Harry left me to go to class,” she says and he can actually hear her pouting without opening his eyes.

“Mhjmdf,” he says and sniffles.

“What’s wrong?” she says immediately, throwing herself on his bed and knocking into him. She starts apologising when she sees his wince, petting his face frantically. “Are you _dying_? Oh my god, Liam, what’s wrong?”

“I think I’m sick,” he says and Louis’ touch feels so cool on his heated skin. He was feeling _fine_ when he went to bed, he doesn’t have the time to be sick right now.

Louis just smoothes her palm across his forehead, pushing his hair back and frowns down at him.

“I’ll look after you,” she says, running her finger down the bridge of his nose.

Liam opens his eyes, feeling sluggish and less miserable. “There’s medicine in the,” he starts to say, his voice raspy and fucked when she interrupts.

“I know. I’ll go make some tea, okay? Don’t move,” she says and carefully gets off the bed again, skidding on the floor with her socks.

“You’ve got work,” Liam says, rolling over so he can get up, clutching at his heavy head.

“Don’t worry about it. Your essay was due today, wasn’t it?” she asks, popping her head back into the doorway.

“Yeah,” Liam says, giving up with a sigh of defeat and crumpling back against the pillows.

“I’ll go hand it in, just tell me who I’m supposed to be giving it to,” Louis says, disappearing into the kitchen again.

Liam’s brain is foggy and it’s too much effort to figure out why Louis’ doing all this. She’s got a date with the new coffee barista she was so excited about and she’s _supposed_ to go to work today. Liam reminds her of this when she returns, her hands clasped carefully around a giant mug. Louis only shrugs, setting the steaming tea down on the bedside table and getting back into bed.

“You’re going to get sick, Lou,” Liam tries but Louis’ already pulling the duvet over them and he can’t stop shivering. Louis curls around him, resting her face in between his shoulder blades and mumbles something he can’t quite catch. He falls asleep soon after, everything _aching_ in the worst possible but Louis pressed all up against his back, warm and sturdy and that’s alright, isn’t it?

~

After a moment, Louis excuses herself to go to the bathroom, shooting Liam a telling look under her eyelashes. He watches her until she disappears inside and turns to his parents, rubbing his hand across his cheeks.

“She seems _nice_ ,” his dad says and Liam doesn’t like the way he says the word. He doesn’t lower his eyebrows and Liam has the urge to ask him if he’s had a bad run-in with botox with the way it’s been in a constant state of confusion tonight.

His parent’s aren’t bad people, Liam loves them with all his heart but they can be a bit too much and Liam doesn’t know how he expected this to go.

“How is Danielle? She was such a nice, talented young woman. Is she still going into medicine? Do you still keep in contact with her?” his mum asks gently, reaching forward to grab his hand.

Liam grits his teeth, just smiles at the both of them before excusing himself as well. He makes his way to the toilet, blood simmering under his skin and stops in front of the ladies toilet instead. He looks around quickly, biting the inside of his cheek and slips inside before he can change his mind or somebody stops him.

Louis’ drying her hands and she gasps in mock horror when she catches sight of him in the mirror. The bathroom is deserted besides them which is a good thing because Liam’s walked across towards her before he knows what’s happening. Louis laughs in delight, pressing him into the carefully painted walls immediately.

“Louis,” Liam tries, closing his eyes so he won’t give in to the urge to kiss her. She’s not making it easy though, not with the way she’s undoing his belt and trying to push her hand down his pants.

He spins them around, holding Louis against the wall and she laughs breathlessly against him and says, “Didn’t know you had it in you, babe.”

“Lou, you need to _behave_ ,” he groans even if he’s already half-hard and all he wants to do is get the fuck out of here with Louis.

“You’re so nervous,” she says, petting at his belly through his shirt, her voice pitched low and soothing. She tilts her head up, brushing their lips together and says, “Are you embarrassed?” She says it in such a way, all understanding and _Louis_ , it makes anger curl at his core, mostly at himself.

“No, no, that’s not it,” he says and kisses her hard, means it. He’s not embarrassed of _her_. “I don’t know. They’re being so… They’re a lot to handle and it’s important, that – that my parents like you,” he says quietly and ducks down to hide his face in the crook of her neck, inhaling.

She wraps her arms around his neck, pulling him in closer and rocking slightly. She kisses his ear and says, “Don’t worry about me, I can handle myself. _You_ need to loosen up, darling, there’s no space for your birthday present with that massive stick stuck up your arse.”

Liam laughs into her neck and stays still for a little while longer. He draws back, smoothing down her hair with his palms and leaning forward to kiss her again.

“You’re so lovely,” he says softly, hunched over her smaller frame. He doesn’t want to see his expression in the mirror, he has a feeling every single thing he feels for Louis is painted so blatantly on his face.

“Is it the dress?” she asks, batting her eyelashes up at him coyly, swishing her dress around her knees.

“No,” he says honestly and Louis stills, stops playing with her dress. She stares up at him for another minute before reaching up to kiss him again, nipping at his lips before pulling back.

“I love you,” she says, her eyes crinkling at the corners.

“I love you too,” he says and laughs again when she reaches up on her tippy toes and licks the side of his face enthusiastically.

~

Liam breaks up with his girlfriend of four years two weeks after he meets Louis. He’s not planning to do anything about it; about Louis because he can’t stand the thought of not having her in his life. He just thinks it’s _unfair_ to Danielle. How he’s capable of loving someone so much more.


End file.
